


Came Back Around

by irrelevant



Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-17
Updated: 2010-04-17
Packaged: 2017-10-09 00:12:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,499
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/80920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/irrelevant/pseuds/irrelevant
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes dead civilizations should stay dead.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Came Back Around

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not sure I like what my ability to create this kind of scenario says about my subconscious. Disturbing story is disturbing, I wrote it and it disturbs me. But life is disturbing, sometimes it sucks and we can't do anything to stop the bad. So. Caveat lector.

Somebody is shouting. It's not me, the acoustics are wrong even if my throat is raw enough for it. The inside of my throat feels like it's been torched then doused in tequila. Breathing is my new pain threshold.

I can't stop, not moving or breathing. The phasers haven't overloaded yet and the stasis field is still up. I'm not where I need to be.

I'm not even supposed to be here.

Sensor readings showed Gidris Prime as an uncolonized class M. Some interesting mineral deposits on the northern continents, weird energy readings and plant life Bones wanted to get a look at to the south. Spock backed him up for once, so I said okay and we went south.

Scotty beamed us down into what was supposed to be the outskirts of a jungle, it looked like a swamp to me, and suddenly we're standing in the middle of a bazaar. For a planet with no sentient life there was a lot of civilization going on.

We were screwed from go. Communications were dead and subcutaneous UTs don't work that great in the first place, but this time there was extra interference; Spock said some kind of electromagnetic field. We were getting one word in twenty, mostly the same things repeated over and over. I kept hearing 'fair' and 'blue' and something else that sounded like gibberish in any language.

We were still trying to communicate with someone, anyone, when a bunch of guys with swords showed up. What a surprise. These gentlemen proceeded to escort us to a big stone building—did I mention everything was built out of stone?—that screamed 'temple'. And that's when _everything_ went south.

What really surprised me was the total lack of interrogation. No "Who are you?" or "How'd you get here?" or even "What do you want?" They didn't even ask if we needed to take a piss. They took everything we had on us, tech, clothes, you name it, and then they filled me full of their brand of anesthesia and killed Bones.

They tore him apart. Just ripped him open right in front of me, and I watched, I fucking watched and I wanted to move and I couldn't _move._ They said they were honoring me. They said I had to…sacrifice.

I don't know how close these people's belief system is to what it started out as back in Mesoamerica, but I'm betting somewhere along the line somebody translated the sacred cave paintings wrong. Spock—

He'd know.

He went with them. He saw what they did to Bones and he just let them take him. Because of me, because I was a drugged-out zombie. I would have stood there and let them gut me, and he knew it.

Why the hell did the Preservers pick _this_ civilization to save? Is the field protecting the people here, or everyone else in the galaxy? Maybe they wanted to speed up colony growth, keep their little science project isolated until the test subjects got smart enough to figure out how to turn the field off themselves. They've progressed some—they're working with steel—but not enough to get them past blind, superstitious ignorance.

Speed up…or slow down. For all I know, I'll get the field down and the _Enterprise_ will be ten years in the future.

The head priest didn't know jack about the temporal distortion parameters. He knew what, not how or why. He would have told me if he did. When I was done with him, he was telling me whatever I wanted to hear. That's how I know about the field. It's how I figured out why the UTs worked better the closer to the temple we got. Whoever dumped these people here needed their control center to work right; the temple got built up around it.

"Scotty, come in. Scotty. This is Kirk, do you read?" Fuck. Communications are still down. I've been checking about every ten minutes since I got free because I'm that stubborn. Or maybe I'm just dumb. The priests seemed to think so; they didn't bother putting any guards on me. The acid stuff was supposed to put me in a trance or something, make me easy to manage. I guess unconsciousness counts.

I was out for a couple of hours, that's what the head guy said. I woke up and puked all over him and while he was freaking out I grabbed him.

I wanted to kill him. God I wanted to, so much I swear I could smell his blood through his skin. I wanted to dig my fingers into his throat and rip his trachea out. I wanted to shove it back down his throat into his lungs. I didn't. I smacked him a couple of times to get his attention and we took a walk; to pick up clothes and a phaser first, then to the place where they took Spock.

Archaeologists call them step pyramids. This one wasn't big but it did have a lot of steps that went up to a simple stone structure at the top. We stood in the doorway, the priest and me, and we looked at what was inside the room, and then we went back down and he took me to the control room.

Rooms, actually. There was a command center, three or four control consoles and next door, the machinery and power structure. The entire set-up ran on crystal-generated power. Not dilithium crystals. I've never seen anything like them before, and I don't think anyone else in the Federation has either.

Whoever the engineers were, they knew their stuff. They managed to cover an entire planet with a stasis field and throw some sort of holographic energy cloak over that. It's tech way beyond anything the Federation has, and they need to know that a civilization capable of producing this kind of technology is, or was, around. Right now I can't reach my ship, much less try to rig something capable of subspace transmission. Even if I do get the field down, I'm not sure I'll be able to contact the ship or anyone else—but I have an idea about that.

I'm not Spock, temporal distortion isn't my area of expertise. But nobody else has beamed down so far, and I think a lot less time has passed out there than it has in here. I'm betting that when the field comes down the Enterprise will be right where I left her. And I've still got our communicators. The priests dumped all our stuff in a pile in the central room; I don't know what they were going to do with it. Burn it, maybe. Like Bones.

The smell, the ash is still on my skin.

_took everything all I've got left are_

Bones' specimen bag, Spock's tricorder, and we were all carrying phasers, we just never got the chance to use them. By the time 'life-threatening overtures' were made it was all over. I'm making up for that. There's a lot you can do with a phaser besides shoot someone. I set the first one to take out the primary control console. The second—that's rigged to the power crystals. That'll make a nice little bonfire.

I think I stunned most of the temple priests, they should be coming around soon. I didn't even kill the head guy; I just left him in the control room. He might wake up in time to get out. He's got a chance, and that's more than he gave Bones or Spock.

If I make it out of here, make it back to the _Enterprise_, I'll have a court-martial waiting for me. If I'd just disabled the field and got my ass out, I could probably avoid being brought up on charges. I'm so far beyond that I'm in another galaxy.

I wish I'd listened to my gut instead of my head back at the beam-down point. My head said to go along with the natives until I could get my people safely out. My gut said phasers, don't go with the sword guys, and run really fast. The problem with the second scenario is collateral damage.

We're not supposed to attack unless we've been directly and absolutely beyond a shadow of a doubt threatened, not on a first contact mission before relations, peaceful or hostile, have been established. We're also not supposed to interfere in the development of any civilization which has yet to achieve warp-driven space flight. Starfleet is a peace-keeping, exploratory armada, explorers who go out and make the galaxy safe for everyone. That's the pitch Chris Pike threw me six years ago. He had Dad for backup ammo, but he didn't really need him. I bought because I wanted to; I was ready to believe. After what happened to Dad I can say that yeah, I joined up with my eyes wide open.

But Bones? All he wanted was to get out of a bad situation; he didn't ask for this shit. I've never been a hundred percent sure why Spock was out here. His psych eval reads like an explanation in itself: half human, half vulcan, blah blah, treated him and his mother like crap, never fit in anywhere, blah. Bullshit. And I don't mean his history, I'm talking about his reasons.

Uhura told me that Spock basically flipped the Vulcan Council off for bad-mouthing his mom. She said that's why he joined the Fleet. I don't buy it, not as his only reason or even his main reason.

I think he wanted the stars. He spends—spent a lot of his free time on the observation decks. Sometimes with Uhura, sometimes by himself. Sometimes we'd be on the same deck at the same time. The look on his face…

He probably saw the same look on my face. They say you recognize in other people what you see in yourself. I recognized him.

Behind me someone laughs, loud and sharp. I jerk and my boot catches on a loose stone, and I catch myself against the wall of the nearest building before I fall. I resettle Bones' bag and look around. I'm near the end of an alley, two streets over from where I'm headed; the first of two suns is going down and my shadow is a creepy tangle down on the cobbled stone street.

I wait for a hand-pulled cart and three women to pass the mouth of the alley. I pull the priest's robe up to cover my head and follow.

*

When I make it back to the pyramid, there's half as much light. There isn't a square inch of my body that doesn't hurt. I've run the route between the temple and the pyramid three times, and now I make myself run back up the stone steps.

Like the first time, there are no guards around. According to my favorite priest, they don't use the facilities much anymore, just when there's a drought or a flood or a new god in town. Apparently they only drag out the ceremonial knives for special occasions.

We gave them one hell of an occasion.

At the top of the pyramid I stop and catch my breath. I'd check the chronometer but it's timing down the plasma build up back at the temple. I think the field is screwing with the functions; phaser one should have detonated already.

I think I'm trying to be Spock, standing around overanalyzing everything when I should be doing something.

And maybe I'm standing out here like an idiot because I don't want to go in.

The way they killed Bones was personal; just for me. Spock—they gave him to one of their other gods, I think the one that makes sure there are no droughts or floods. I guess he's jealous. He doesn't appreciate assholes like me encroaching on his territory.

He does appreciate blood. So much that the center stone inside the room has channels carved into it, they run down the stone and connect with the geometrical patters sunk into the floor. I wonder if the color surprised him.

It sure surprised the priests.

I didn't go in the first time I came up here, I just stood in the door. Now I walk the perimeter of the room, I walk around deep-cut, patterned lines twisting themselves into curves, until I reach the center of concentric circles and I'm standing beside the central slab.

Spock's always had really white skin; I used to give him hell about needing a tan but he'd just look at me until I shut up and left him alone. White isn't the right word anymore. I can see through it, his veins stuck up and out, his bony angles, and all his color is sitting in those fancy marks on the floor.

I let myself look at his face and at first I think there's something wrong with his eyes. I lean closer and I can see that his inner lids are up. They probably gave him the same stuff they gave me, put him out of commission before they—

They chained him down. Their iron is crap, he could have broken out of it if he wasn't drugged to the gills. If I wasn't so impatient to get out of dry dock that I took someone else's survey assignment, he wouldn't have been here at all.

I should have told Decker no. He asked me to take over his survey course, his wife was about to give birth to their second kid and I was bored, so…

I'm reaching down to brush Spock's hair straight when the first phaser goes. Screams and shouts rise out of the roar of the explosion and the pyramid shudders around me. I brace my legs and ride out the shakes. I listen to the dull crack of rock breaking up and I manage to get Spock's bangs flattened out against his forehead. Close his eyes the rest of the way. If it wasn't for the gaping hole that used to be his abdomen and his torn lower lip, I'd think he was asleep.

> Stardate 2261.712, end-of-mission report submitted by Kirk, James T, Captain _USS Enterprise_. On this date the routine planetary survey of Gidris Prime degenerated into a complete goatfuck. The natives who weren't supposed to be there were definitely hostile. They drugged me then dismembered my CMO, and since my XO didn't want to get me killed he let them kill him, instead. They cut him open, he bit through his lip, they took his heart out and he died.
> 
> Action taken by commanding officer: destruction of highly advanced alien technology followed by attempted genocide. Recommendation? Planetary quarantine. Secondary recommendation: that the Starfleet Medal of Honor be awarded posthumously to Lieutenant Commander Leonard McCoy and Commander Spock Xtmprsqzntwlfb, for bravery beyond what's owed anyone or any damn thing in this life. End report.

Yeah, I'm done.

Three years. Three fucking years, god _damn_ it.

I can't hear through the noise in my head, through how bad I've fucked up this time coming down on me, but I can feel the pyramid shaking under me, stones shaking loose from the foundation. The second phaser just blew. I use the last phaser to cut Spock loose, and then I wrap him in the priest's robe as tight as I can. I pull Bones' pack over my shoulder, haul Spock up against me and flip open my communicator. "Scotty, come in."

Static. Then, "Captain?"

_Breathe, Kirk._ "Yeah. One to beam up."

"…Just the one."

"Affirmative, Mr. Scott. Energize." My voice is wrecked. I don't know how Scotty understands me, but he does and that works for me. The beam pulls at me and I close my eyes and rest my forehead against the top of Spock's head, and then the transporter platform is hard under my knees. Spock's head is heavy on my shoulder and someone says, "Oh my god," and someone else pukes.

My eyes are still shut. I rasp, "Get a medical team in here," and talking feels weird, like my mouth is disconnected from the rest of me. I can still feel; there's Spock up against me and I know someone's touching my arm, but the sensation isn't solid.

I open my eyes and Rand is kneeling in front of me, and I grin at her. It wasn't her throwing up, her stomach's tritanium.

"Sir," she says, "you need to let go of him, sir," and my grin flatlines, drops down into the acid pit that used to be my gut.

"Sir." New voice, and I don't recognize this one. I turn my head. Dark hair, skin, eyes, he's kneeling next to Rand. Science blue, medical insignia on his tunic.

"Where's Bones?" Jesus, that was me, I _asked_—

"I'm Dr. M'Benga, Captain. We'll take him now." He says it carefully, like he's trying to sweet talk a half-broken colt.

I've ridden my share of green-brokes. No baby-face in medical gear gets to ride me. I look past him to Rand; I say, "Get Scotty on the comm," and she says, "Yes, sir," and gets up.

M'Benga, I think that's what he said his name was, is still trying. "Captain, I need to—"

"You need to shut up," I say, and I look at him, and he closes his mouth.

"Captain?" Scotty's voice comes in over the comm just as Uhura falls through the transporter bay hatch. She sees me, and Spock, and her momentum is gone like it never was.

Hey Spock, I think your girlfriend finally went Vulcan. I've never seen skin the color hers is turn green before.

She's staring like this is the rest of her life, right here, right now. Then she looks at me and there's the question. The one I'm gonna get asked over and over, and it won't get easier, but I think this time is going to be one of the worst.

Begging without saying, and oh fuck, her eyes. I guess I'm not surprised the best comm officer in the Fleet is just as good without words as she is with them.

Nyota. Don't you get it?

I wasn't even in the running, okay? You won. All I need is for him to open his eyes and look at me and request that I remove my filthy carcass from his person. Just that and I'm good.

"Transporter three, Scott here. Am I gettin' through?"

_No._ "Yeah Scotty, I've got you."

"Thank bleeding fuck," he says, and if I could laugh, I would.

"Phaser banks," I say, "Lock onto the last verified transporter coordinates."

Scotty's real quiet, and then he says, "Jim. Are you sure you want to," but I cut him off.

"That's an order, Commander."

"Aye-aye, sir."

There's a burst of orders and orders getting followed coming at me through the comm mic. Nyota is still standing where she stopped moving. She's still looking at me; I don't think she's looked anywhere else since she got here. I'm trying to meet her halfway but there's nothing for me to grab hold of but Spock, and then Chekov says, "Phasers locked."

_You couldn't pay me to ride that hell-spawned contraption. I'm a doctor, not a masochist._

"Fire."

_If you persist in refusing the security detail, I will have no choice but to accompany you._

"Firing phasers."

_You green-oiled machine, you wouldn't know compassion if it walked up and hugged you!_

"Again," I say, and I hear Scotty relay my command.

"Firing."

_You are my…friend. The emotion is positive and still, I feel shame. Jim. I do not understand._

"Captain?"

"Enough, Scotty." Is it?

Nyota's eyes are finally closed. There's red dripped down on the deck; her knuckles are white bone through dark skin stretched too tight.

"Scotty." Shot to hell and I sound like shit, too. "Get us out of here," I croak.

Scotty doesn't answer in words; his _aye sir_ is the burn of his engines, the warp drive's accelerating whine. I'm looking down at the top of Spock's head. His hair looks the same as it always does, smooth, stupid bowl cut. I told him it made him look like a dork. He said, _it is traditional_. Like that's an answer.

Tradition. Custom. Ritual. Superstitious bullshit.

Fuck 'em all.

Spock's heavy and my arms are starting to shake. I ease him down onto the transporter platform and I stand, and the last few hours slam hard into me. Nyota grabs me before I hit the deck. I think she's shouting but it's like I'm hearing her through a wall of water. I think I'm just gonna pass out now.

Hands grab at my shoulders, my legs. My ears are ringing and someone is…laughing.

Out of the past or down from the future, hell, I don't know where Nero is and I don't need to. He's in my brain. Coming in loud and clear, and laughing his dead ass off.


End file.
